


There's a good kind of pain

by EVVS



Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe - Tattoo Parlor, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Burns, Clint Barton Needs a Hug, Deaf Clint Barton, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Minor Steve Rogers/Tony Stark, Natasha is a little shit, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Scars, Steve isn't the best at helping Bucky, Tattoos, Winterhawk Week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-28
Updated: 2015-09-28
Packaged: 2018-04-23 18:14:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,957
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4886809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EVVS/pseuds/EVVS
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The last couple times Natasha had been around to check on Bucky, she’d tossed around the idea that maybe he should get a tattoo to cover up the burns. She and Steve both knew he was sensitive about it, usually not even willing to look at it; most days, it was so bad to the point that he showered with a t-shirt on. So covering up his mutilated skin made sense, right?</p><p>(Tattoo Artist Winterhawk AU)</p>
            </blockquote>





	There's a good kind of pain

**Author's Note:**

> Winterhawk Week 2015: Day 7 - Pain

It’s dawn, and the light leaks in the window through the holes in the curtains. As much as he’d like to not function for the day, he knows Steve’ll give him hell if he doesn’t get up and moving. He had yesterday as his mental health day, and he isn’t supposed to take two in a row.

So he does get moving. Up. Out of bed. To the bathroom. Basic functions.

After answering nature’s call, he shifts to stand in front of the bathroom mirror. Bucky turns on the sink and splashes water on his face. It’s so cold, and he knows now he has no need to go back to bed. He’s doing okay. Better than yesterday, at least.

Staring at himself in the mirror, his eyes are dark from lack of sleep, his hair is shaggy and dirty, and he hasn’t shaved in a couple days, so stubble is covering the lower half of his face, but at least it doesn’t look terrible. Even though he looks a little bit like he’s taken a nice long walk through hell, he’s got some self-confidence. And with enough courage, Bucky tugs up one corner of his shirt.

His side is scarred from the burns, and it’s beyond repair at this point. When he looks up at himself in the mirror, he can see the difference between the mess that his skin is compared to what it once was. That was then, this is now. There are a lot of differences from what he was before and what he is now. For starters, he had both arms.

“You want bacon?”

Steve’s voice scares the shit out of him, and Bucky finds himself clinging to the sink as if for dear life, knuckles turning white. His other arm, basically reduced to a stump from the blast, is just tucked tightly against his body, almost like he’s trying to shield his chest, but it’s barely managing to cover where his heart is.

“Shit, Buck, I’m sorry,” breathes Steve from behind him. When Bucky finally spots him in the mirror, his eyes are wide, and maybe he looks just about as startled as Bucky feels right about now. “Are you alright?” He’s reaching out a cautious hand, but he doesn’t necessarily know what to do.

“M’fine.”

Bucky can’t get mad at Steve. He’s never been able to get mad at Steve for anything, but it’s still tough when Steve doesn’t get it. Steve’s careful and cautious, but he’s not perfect when it comes to trying to take care of Bucky’s problems. No one is, no one ever will be, but Steve’s doing the best he can, and Bucky can’t ask for anything more.

Although he still looks worried, maybe even a little spooked, Steve asks a second time, “You want bacon for breakfast?” He’s just chock full of good intentions, that small man.

Bucky takes a deep breath and loosens his grip on the sink. His fingers are sore. “Yeah. Bacon’s the best way to start the day. You know that, punk.” He forces a grin, which he’s glad to see Steve return, like everything is back to normal. (Even though it never will be.)

“Awesome.” And just like that, the scrawny little runt of a man is disappearing back to the kitchen, and a distant song of clanging kitchen utensils is all that Bucky’s left with.

It takes nearly twenty minutes, but eventually, Bucky’s settled down, clean-shaven, and in the kitchen.

“Natasha set you up with an appointment today,” informs Steve in his polite voice as he’s filling up a mug of coffee. He hands it to a frowning Bucky, who is clearly displeased with this information.

His narrowed eyes watch Steve move to scramble some eggs. “I don’t wanna go to the VA,” Bucky reminds pointedly before taking a sip of his coffee.

“Not at the VA.” Steve sounds a little bit like a pompous asshole right there, but Bucky’ll let it slide because _no one is trying to force him to go to the VA._ (It might be the first time since he got back that they’re not pushing him.) “The appointment with Tony we’ve been talking about, remember?”

He nods and shrugs slightly in acknowledgement before drinking more coffee because coffee is what gets him through the day. Bucky managed to get himself out of bed, but coffee is what keeps him from crashing fast and hard. “I remember, I just didn’t think you were serious about it.”

The last couple times Natasha had been around to check on Bucky, she’d tossed around the idea that maybe he should get a tattoo to cover up the burns. She and Steve both knew he was sensitive about it, usually not even willing to look at it; most days, it was so bad to the point that he showered with a t-shirt on. So covering up his mutilated skin made sense, right?

Except he’d have to trust someone else to not only look at those burns, but to touch them and turn them into art somehow.

Bucky doesn’t have that much faith in people anymore.

“We were serious.” Steve serves up scrambled eggs and dumps some bacon on a plate before sliding it to Bucky. “You don’t have to do it, but we at least wanted to see if you’d go over there and think about it.” There’s a long moment of silence while Steve serves up his own plate. “I mean, you haven’t left the apartment in days, Buck.”

He doesn’t look up at Steve. Instead, he prods at the food on his plate with a fork before setting that down and brushing his hair out of his eyes. Suddenly, Bucky wants to go back to bed and ask for another mental health day. He could just wrap himself up in his nice warm blankets and sleep away today, the same thing he did yesterday. Except the sleep he gets is restless and messy, and the nightmares have him screaming in the middle of the day.

Bucky cannot keep doing this to Steve.

“I’ll go,” Bucky says before taking a bite of his eggs. (Steve makes them wrong, but food is food, and at this point, he’d rather starve than try to put in the effort to make his own meals.) “Don’t know what I’ll do there, but I’ll go.”

“Hopefully you’ll get a tattoo.”

He runs a hand through his hair and drinks more coffee. Bucky knows he’ll have to polish off his plate to make Steve happy, and he’ll probably have to get a tattoo to make Steve happy. It’s like every day is just a game of trying not to disappoint Steve, and he did that yesterday, so he doesn’t want to do it today. Today, he has to at least try.

* * *

When Bucky shows up at Stark’s tattoo place, he’s cold as hell, just wants his bed, and he’s damn tired of trying to function. It’s been six hours since he got up, and he’s already done and ready to crash again. 

But no, he can’t do that because it’s time for the actual stimulating part of his day. He’s left the apartment. He’s at the tattoo place. Bucky just has to keep powering on for long enough so that Steve is happy, and hey, his therapist said that new things would be good for him. Bucky’s pretty sure she didn’t mean getting a tattoo in his roommate’s boyfriend’s sketchy tattoo parlor, but that’s beside the point.

This is probably not bad for him at least, right?

Apparently, when he asks for Tony, Tony isn’t in today. Tony was never scheduled for today.

Fuck Natasha.

But his appointment, according to this nice girl whose nametag reads Maria, is with a guy named Clint, and some note that someone (probably Natasha) put down says that Maria is supposed to tell Bucky “Just trust him, he’s stupidly great”. Like that’s reassuring.

So he’s hauled himself out of bed, walked almost fifteen blocks through the snow, and is now supposed to hand himself off to a total stranger? It seems like he doesn’t have a choice because a backroom is opening, and some guy steps out, and Bucky watches him scan the room real quick (Bucky notes he has hearing aids in.) before rolling up the sleeves of his flannel just high enough that some ink can be visible.

Bucky’s pretty sure this was a terrible idea.

“You must be the one Natasha sent me, yeah?” This new guy- Clint- is coming closer and offers a hand for shaking. (He doesn’t even seem phased by the one arm thing.)

When Bucky takes it, he gets to see Clint’s ink: it’s all just arrows, like an arsenal, all pointed towards his hand, all elegantly detailed, all black and fine-lined and clean-cut. But that’s just his arms because then there are little details where it’s like a crudely drawn yin yang symbol near his wrist and _why_ -

“I’m James,” he introduces himself after a second of his voice not coming to him because Clint’s tattoos are distracting. The delay has created a little anxious bubble in his chest, and this wasn’t a good idea- “My roommate, Steve, he just told me to come here. I’m really not interested in tattoos, honestly. He just thought it’d be a good idea.”

Clint’s lips purse a little bit. “So you’re Tony’s boyfriend’s roommate?” he questions with a brow raised curiously.

“Yeah,” Bucky breathes out because maybe he can get out of here without too many issues. He’ll have to walk back through the cold, and Steve’ll be disappointed in him, but at least he’ll be in his bed. Maybe Steve’ll even bring him tea-

“And Natasha specifically sent you to me?”

Bucky’s brain is lurching to a halt; Clint’s fishing for something, and he can tell, but what he’s fishing for is still elusive. “Yes.” The affirmation comes out uncertain. “Even though Steve said I was gonna be with Tony.”

Clint’s face softens. (Is that pity?) “C’mon. You’re here for a reason.”

Even though about seven different alarms are going off in Bucky’s head, he follows Clint into the room he’d just come out of; two more alarms go off when Clint closes the door behind them, but Bucky files his concerns away, knowing that Natasha and Steve have his best interests at heart. (Even though they’re pricks for lying to him.)

The room is dark, and in the middle of it is a table next to a little cart of supplies, which looks ominous but not creepy. The walls are all brick, just like the rest of the building, and along the walls are all kinds of tattoos. Most of them look dark and dangerous, huge black pieces of sharp lines and long points that look like they should belong on incredibly burly men. Some are light scrawls, almost like sketches of things to come.

When Bucky’s scanning the art on the walls, he catches a glimpse of Clint, who appears to have shrugged out of his flannel and is now taking his shirt off and- “Woah there, the fuck you think you’re doing?” It’s like one huge ‘Stranger Danger’ signal is blaring in his head. (Fucking paranoia.)

Clint looks immediately flustered, face flushed a rosy shade of pink. “Shit, sorry, I should’ve explained myself, my bad, my bad.” He’s incredibly apologetic, and Bucky’s almost not entirely worried anymore. Clint doesn’t seem like a dick. Just unaware. “Wasn’t trying to be creepy, I was just gonna show you my ink.”

That doesn’t sound too terrible. “Go for it.” Because there’s got to be a reason for all this bullshit today, and this guy must have some of the answers that’ll help to connect the dots.

Now Clint pulls off his shirt in one swift motion.

This man is covered in tattoos, like a living piece of art. Thick lines of arrows run horizontally across his back, all black, all patterned, all textured. There are little spots of color, and when Bucky can’t make out exactly what they are, he says lowly, “You mind if I-“

“Go for it,” Clint says, clearly comfortable with himself as he takes a deep breath. “You can touch ‘em, too, if you want.”

Bucky takes a few steps closer and finds that he does want to touch them because how does that kind of texturing happen-

_Oh._

The shafts of the arrows are about as thick as a belt, Bucky realizes just before his stomach sinks. He’s pretty sure he’s going to be sick. But it only gets worse when he starts to look a little closer because that’s how it’s all textured. Scars.

The little patches of color are tiny, circular burn marks that have been covered up in crude, almost childish ways to disguise the fact that they’re from where someone pressed a cigarette into this man’s skin. A sun conceals one burn; a daisy hides another. One is just a red circle with a white star drawn over it. Another is a purple target.

When Bucky moves to look at the front of a shirtless Clint, he’s almost relieved to see that Clint’s chest is almost entirely bare. There’s a small scrawl of the name ‘Barton’ at his collarbone, but aside from that, his chest is nothing more than incredible pecs and, surprisingly, nipple piercings.

Then his arms catch Bucky’s eye, and if his back was bad, then what’re all these-

“They’re from a dark time,” says Clint, as if reading Bucky’s mind. (Or maybe Bucky said that out loud, _shit_.) “I did archery in high school, which is why I covered myself almost entirely in arrows.” He says it like it’s casual, but then he lays his arms out for display, and the scars are hidden under dark ink, but they’re still there. “I was a little bit of a masochist in high school, so I refused to use my arm guard for a while. Scarred the shit out of the left like that.” He laughs, running his fingers along the old wounds.

Bucky’s throat feels thick. The words come out heavy when he asks, “And the right?”

Clint’s eyes- they’re a subdued blue, Bucky duly notes- flicker to watch Bucky’s face. “Different method. Different intention. Same result.” He rolls his arm back so Bucky can see the long-healed slits a little more clearly. “A lot of the ink is just to balance out my arms at this point, honestly. Except this one.” He taps at the name on his collarbone. “That’s the only one that isn’t covering anything up or balancing anything out. It’s for my brother.”

Really, Bucky doesn’t think he wants to know.

“But this is why they sent you to me instead of Tony.” Clint makes a move to put his shirt back on, but as he does so, he keeps talking: “Tony does great work and stuff, but he’s kind of insensitive. And he’d probably give you shit about Steve, which I’m assuming is something you don’t need right now.”

Wherever this man came from, Bucky wishes he knew more guys like him.

“So if you wanna get a tattoo, I’m the guy you’ll want. My buddy Thor did most of mine only because I couldn’t always reach, but whenever people are doing ink to cover shit up, I’m the guy they come to.” And Clint just _sounds_ reassuring. He sounds like he knows how rough it can be, how the world can be a downright awful place, and he _gets it._ He’s not Captain Positivity like Steve, but he’s more like Captain Promise right now. The promise of something better in life. A reminder that maybe the world isn’t totally evil.

“Yeah.” Bucky isn’t even sure why he wants a tattoo now. But he trusts Clint. Instinctively. “Yeah, I’m game.”

Clint’s readjusting his shirt now that he’s got it back on, and even though Clint’s looking at the floor, Bucky can tell he’s grinning.

Some paperwork and what feels like seven decades later, Bucky finally gets to pull off his shirt. He’s apprehensive for all of two seconds before stripping it off because he needs this. He’s never run into someone who understands it, and Clint doesn’t understand the war or the fire or the trauma, but he understands the scars. He understands the stories they leave behind and the unseen marks they leave on people.

“Wow, that’s huge,” remarks Clint with wide eyes.

(Bucky sucks in a breath and pretends like he doesn’t want to pull his shirt on and rush the hell out of there.)

“Any ideas what you wanna do with it?”

His stomach rolls because Clint’s the first person to _not ask_ as soon as he pulls his shirt off. Something inside of him almost wants to tell him, especially considering the way that Clint was so willing to share earlier. Still, Bucky keeps his mouth shut about that and instead says, “Natasha said I should get fire or somethin’.”

“That’s sick and ironic,” Clint comments with a crinkled nose as he points to the table that Bucky’s apparently supposed to lay on. “What do you want?”

Bucky moves to perch himself on the table and finds that Clint’s standing in front of him, staring down at him intently, so Bucky answers, “Steve said I should get an American flag.” And when Clint raises a questioning eyebrow, Bucky answers lowly, “It happened when I was overseas for the Marines.”

Again, Clint’s nose crinkles up. “Also slightly sick and ironic.” But then he puts a hand on Bucky’s knee, cautiously but not fearfully, and asks a third time, “What do _you_ want, James?”

He forgot he’d introduced himself as James. Fuck that. “You can call me Bucky.”

Clint nods in a way that makes Bucky wonder if maybe he already knew through the grapevine. “Well then, Bucky, what would you like to tattoo on your body today?” 

“Something that’ll bury my problems.” Because he has no fucking idea what he wants. He’s made all his choices for the past six months since getting out of recovery based on just surviving the day. He hasn’t needed to make any life changing decisions in a while, and maybe this isn’t life changing, but this is the biggest decision he’s had to make in a long time.

But God help him because Clint just calmly shrugs and goes, “I can do that.” Then he snaps on some medical gloves.

Surprisingly, Bucky’s comfortable with this. Reassured by it, even. He’s perfectly happy at the mercy of a stranger. A stranger who understands. “Just make sure it’s pretty.”

“Again, I can do that.” Clint’s laughing a little more this time; his laugh sounds golden. He’s got the gun prepped and is holding it near Bucky’s skin. Where his gloved hand is on Bucky’s side, his touch is gentle. “This is gonna hurt, you okay with that?”

Now it’s Bucky’s turn to chuckle. “I’m used to pain, Clint. Pretty sure you’re aware of that by now.”

There’s a pause. Then Clint leans back, and he’s studying Bucky’s face slowly. He takes a couple of deep breaths before explaining, “This isn’t the same kind of pain you’re thinking of. This isn’t the kind of pain that’ll leave you wrecked for years and years.” (Clint says it like he knows, and Bucky’s chest tightens a little bit.) “This is the kind of pain that’ll hurt now but will be worth it because it’s creating something beautiful. It’s not meant to leave you raw or hurting. It’s so that you can walk away with some peace of mind.” Those blue eyes search Bucky’s face hopefully. “You understand that, right?”

“Yeah,” he says as he realizes he should find some reason to get to know Clint better. “Yeah, I get that.”

He can actually feel Clint’s sigh of relief: a hot puff of air on his skin just before Clint sets to work. It stings, but, throughout the process, he can feel Clint breathing on him. It’s calming. It’s soothing.

He trusts Clint.

* * *

When he gets back home, he kicks off his shoes into the communal shoe pile and heads towards the kitchen because _damn is he hungry-_  

“Hey, Buck!” calls Steve from the couch as Bucky passes. And Bucky has to slow down and pause and actually have a decent conversation, and when he looks in, he sees Natasha there, looking at him just as expectantly as Steve is. And the scrawny little punk goes, “How’d it go?”

“Got a tattoo.” He’s not happy with either of them right now, but it doesn’t appear that passive aggressive Post-Its are the answer in this situation, so minimal responses is all they’re getting, the damn pricks.

“Let’s see it then,” Steve encourages warmly with that genuinely perfect smile.

Bucky wants to punch him slightly less because he knows Steve is a ball of good intentions. “Can’t. Bandages.” Passive aggressive will get him into the kitchen faster so he can make himself a quick meal and then he can crawl in bed-

“Did you like Clint?"

Just as he was about to turn away, Bucky has to pause at Natasha’s question. His chest had done a little stuttering thing as soon as she’d said his name. _That’s what that was._ (Goddammit, he should’ve gotten Clint’s number.) Bucky runs his one hand through his hair. “Yeah.” He bites the inside of his cheek. “He’s, uh, he’s great.”

“Good because he asked for your number, and I gave it to him.” Natasha flashes a smirk before turning back to whatever book she’s settled in with for the day.

Bucky’s heart is definitely fine. Perfectly fine. Not speeding up whatsoever. He runs his hand through his hair again. “I’m gonna make food,” he huffs before heading off, but not before he hears Steve say lowly, “He hasn’t gone out of his way for food in almost two months.”

But Bucky makes himself a can of soup for dinner and manages to sit through a shitty documentary with Steve and Natasha. Halfway through it, he gets a text that asks whether or not he’s looked at the tattoo yet.

 _Clint_.

Bucky’s first reaction is to save Clint’s number because that’s important. His second reaction is to slowly excuse himself, head to his room, and lock the door behind him. And then he heads into his bathroom.

The Bucky in the mirror stares back at him with tired eyes, shaggy hair, and a clean-shaven face. For some reason, he’s grinning. And he’s less reluctant to pull his shirt up this time; Bucky actually pulls it off entirely for the second time that day. And the bandages that cover his side are massive; he has no idea what’s under them, he just let Clint go at it. As he sees the remnants of his arm, he’s glad he didn’t let Clint touch the stub of his arm. The scars there don’t bother him so much, it’s mostly just the burns. (He remembers the fire. He doesn’t remember his arm being severed.)

Slowly, he peels away the bandages.

There’s a garden crawling up his side. Leaves and petals spreading out everywhere, all across his side, taking on the texture of the burns underneath for an entirely different picture to emerge from what was there before. Huge blooms of blue and yellow and pink are now in his skin forever, and they’re so much more than what Bucky ever could’ve imagined.

When Bucky looks back up at his face in the mirror, he’s still a mess, but he’s a slightly better mess. And he gropes for his phone just to thank Clint.

He’ll find a reason to ask him out for drinks later.

**Author's Note:**

> The title of this is inspired by the song "Symptoms of You" by Lindsay Lohan (because it's a good song, why not)
> 
> Basically, I was going to have them get matching tattoos and then I changed my mind and decided to make this huge and long and it turned into this. I'm happy with how it turned out, I got to mess around with some world-building again, which is always fun.
> 
> Hope you enjoyed it, hit me up on tumblr: skylarkevanson


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